Saturday, November 10, 2012

Funeral Party is interactive performance project comprised of the exploration of healing and death rituals to encourage participants towards realizations of the brevity of life and to aid in connecting to the present.

Funeral Party will take place on New Year's Day, Tuesday, January 1, 2013 at 14 Pews. There will be a eulogy writing service at 6pm with the Funeral Party to begin at 7pm. Those needing help with or wanting to explore their eulogies with others prior to the public presentation, please arrive at 6pm. Admission is a $5-$10 offering to offset funeral expenses.

“The last funeral was so enriching and powerful, it really blew me away,” states organizer/curator Emily Sloan. “For at least a year after the first funeral party, people I met for the first time at the event were contacting me and sharing how it affected them. I am appreciative to be invited by 14 Pews to make this journey again.”

The event will include visitation and drinking, eulogy writing assistance, a funeral service open to the public to speak, sing, share, etc., a funeral sound procession created by the audience along with whatever instruments they'd like to bring, and a funeral pyre for burning symbolic items contributed by the public.

Funeral attire is encouraged.Observers are welcome.

A potluck will follow the event.

ABOUT EMILY SLOAN:
Internationally unknown artist Emily Sloan was born outside of Diboll, Texas to John Bartholomew Sloan and Nancy de Norma H. Sloan. She presently survives and practices art in Houston, Texas. She is the founding reverend of the controversial Southern Naptist Convention (not to be confused with the activities to take place at the Funeral Party), chief curator of The Kenmore exhibition object and organizes Hair Washes for fundraising. One of her greatest accomplishments has been learning to dance despite an upbringing in which it was against her family’s religion. For more information, please visit: www.emilysloanblog.blogspot.com

ABOUT 14 PEWS:
Located at 800 Aurora St., Houston, Texas 77009, this Houston landmark is the oldest white wooden church in the Heights. Built in 1924, it has housed the Sunset Heights Church of Christ, Aurora Picture Show, and is now home to 14 Pews. 14 Pews is a non-profit microcinema providing regular screenings of independent documentaries and feature films, along with 4 annual film festivals and several affordable film/video educational classes. For more information, please visit: www.14pews.org

Saturday, November 3, 2012

This is a little pre-show pimping which was scheduled to go out earlier this week. It was halted due to Superstorm Sandy. I'm happy to report our friends are fine and recovering. I'm sharing it as there is still one more night to see it here in Houston.

City Council Meeting is a participatory theater event taking place
at three different venues in Houston, Texas from November 1-3, 2013. The
November 1 event will take place at Palm Center, 2nd floor
courtroom, 5300 Griggs Road at 7:30pm. The November 2 event will take place at
Project Row Houses’ Eldorado Ballroom, 2310 Elgin St. at 7:30pm. The November 3
event will take place at DiverseWorks, 4102 Fannin St. at 7:30pm. Admission to
all events is free.

The performance is co-presented by the Cynthia Woods Mitchell Center for the
Arts where the event was developed during the 2012 research residency of Aaron
Landsman and DiverseWorks. City Council
Meeting will combine local participants which have selected various roles with
transcripts from several cities’ government meetings along with original
writings. It even touts a surprise ending.

According to the press from the event:
City Council Meeting was initially commissioned and developed through a
residency at HERE Art Center in New York, through the HERE Artist Residency
Program (HARP). City Council Meeting
was made possible with funding by the New England Foundation for the Arts’
National Theater Pilot, with lead funding from The Andrew W. Mellon Foundation.
The project also received support from The MAP Fund, a program of Creative
Capital supported by the Doris Duke Charitable Foundation and The Andrew W.
Mellon Foundation. City Council Meeting
is a National Performance Network (NPN) Creation Fund Project co-commissioned
by DiverseWorks Art Space, in partnership with HERE, Zspace and NPN. The
Creation Fund is supported by the Doris Duke Charitable Foundation, Ford
Foundation, and the National Endowment for the Arts (a federal agency). The
project also received support from the Puffin Foundation, Jerome Foundation and
many individual donors. For more information on City Council Meeting, please visit: citycouncilmeeting.org

This is a short write-up I wrote last month to share about Keren Cytter's vidoe/performance at DiverseWorks. It was not published elsewhere due to a duplicate performance in NYC, so here it is for our local audience.

Keren
Cytter’s Show Real Drama was performed at DiverseWorks Art Space
October 10 through October 13, 2012. This performance is in conjunction with
Cytter’s exhibition Video Art Manual about
the history and development of video art, on view in DiverseWorks’ galleries.

For Show
Real Drama,
the actors are in the role of actors who are creating their own scenes
following failed attempts at finding work as actors. Each scene is introduced
with a projection of the words Show, then Real, then Drama.

For this multimedia
performance, the actors and the audience are present in the now, with the performers
acting out the drama of their relationship while at times even describing
audience members. A video projection of their previous interactions and “drama”
adds a time-based element and reveals more of their “real” drama.

The
combination of live performance and the time element of the video, along with
acting about acting, make for an experience of decided awareness of someone as
they experience an awareness of and interaction with themselves. As in her
exhibition on view where video art is examined through watching video footage,
we are examining drama through watching real drama.

Show Real Drama, written and directed by Keren Cytter, came to
DiverseWorks Art Space following presentations at The Kitchen, Kunsthall
Bergen, and the Tate Modern among other venues. It is the last performance at
DiverseWorks’ current location. For more information about exhibitions and
their new location, please visit: www.diverseworks.org